Does Zenimax listen to the community?

Marto

Yes, I'm really spiritually and emotionally satisfied by the amount of developer interaction and resultant change we've seen. My parents aren't even divorcing anymore!

Developers should listen to good feedback.

Biased, sarcastic and/or cynical polls are not good feedback.

kargen27

Wilddog73 wrote: »

Hurbster wrote: »

Silly poll options.

I especially recommend the ESO VR option, my personal favorite.

kargen27 wrote: »

Wilddog73 wrote: »

BRCOURTN wrote: »

Wilddog73 wrote: »

BRCOURTN wrote: »

Wilddog73 wrote: »

kargen27 wrote: »

Wilddog73 wrote: »

So when was the last time zenimax listened to the community?

I'm guessing each and every day. That we don't get an answer every day doesn't mean they do not listen. When we do get an answer and it isn't the one we want that still doesn't mean they were not listening.
Latest example of Zenimax listening to the community is happening on the PTS now with the addition of house guests.

"God works in mysterious ways"

Theyre developers, they created this world.

This one, where I can rile up dissatisfied gamers and convince some not to sub maybe?

I dont believe you're affecting anyone's decisions. The 5% of players on these forums have generally made up their minds about the game. Not a lot of newbies here. You might try reddit.

Honestly, I wasn't expecting the "No" option to lead the way at all, but there's clearly some discontent.

Kind of human nature. If everything is fine or going like we wish we are less likely to comment than if we perceive things are wrong. You say you want pickles on your burger and don't get them you are apt to complain. You get the pickles you aren't going to take the time to let them know you appreciate they remembered the pickles.

Being a paying customer ain't appreciation enough for ya?

Not pertinent to my comment. My comment refers to this forum.

setayco

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

Don’t agree with the second option of “NEVER” but there has been a year of request for magicka morph of blast bones to be changed with little to no feedback for change. Took about 4-5 years for stamina sorcerer to get a reskin of crushing weapon. Even longer for balanced changes to low costing ultimates that does damage equivalent to high costing highly counter-able ultimates. Nightblades requesting fixes for cloak. Wardens asking for faster birds. Dragonknights wanting a stamina morph of whip. If it doesn’t fall in line with ZoS vision then it more than likely will get ignored.

JKorr

Wilddog73 wrote: »

Why not negotiate? Why not tell us what the problem is with our ideas and work together to come up with a solution or alternative? I'd love to see some community/dev debate.

You apparently don't understand. No matter what the devs say, they are wrong. Solutions are easy and cost nothing to implement because every armchair dev on the forums knows how to do everything. Despite the fact that forum posters and redit users have no idea of the staffing structure, budget concerns, time tables, and future story ideas, the forum posters know exactly what needs to be done and how it should be achieved.

Dev makes a statement that X has to be this way. Due to long worked on development issues, hardware restrictions, legal agreements between Microsoft and Sony, there is no possible way to change it.

Forum poster: But X would be much better if you do *this*.

Dev: It can't be done that way.

Forum poster: Of course it can. ZOS just doesn't want to do anything the players want.

Dev: [carefully not breaking several NDAs with serious consequences] No, it really can't. There are reasons, but we can get into that now.

Forum poster: expletive deleted devs are simply money-grubbing code monkeys who pay no attention to the posters anddon't care about the game. Its completely obvious because they won't explain, post the last year's worth of development meeting minutes, post youtube videos of story development sessions, and offer notarized affidavits of legally binding intent.

A dev did attempt to have a discussion once. A discussion about how they played their character and how they experienced the game. A forum poster kept interrupting demanding information he wasn't allowed to post, demanding that he stop playing and fix the pos game, and just being a wonderful conversationalist in general. The dev, referring to the current discussion about playing the game, made the comment "you know you don't have to be here", and its be used out of context in not very flattering ways ever since. I am really not surprised the devs don't want to talk to the forums.

zergbase_ESO

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

They do not. Server performance is a clear cut example of this.

Bucky_13

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

Voted no mainly because for some reason we still don't have the option to hide shoulder pieces. Or flaps. Which ruins most armors. The shoulders in particular should be such a simple thing to do that it boggles my mind they won't listen to us despite countless threads asking for this.

DTStormfox

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

Been here since launch and have seen multiple bugs, exploits, and performance issues enter the live game that the community voiced their concerns about in the PTS servers.

Most of the developer comments, in the patch notes, only voice the opinions of the development team and very rarely (near to never) these developer comments voice the opinion of the community.

It seems to me that the Forums, the Bug report systems, PTS, and Class representatives systems are just a facade. Deceptive systems that give the community members the idea that their voices are heard but in fact, they are simply ignored.

Maybe you can call it pessimistic, but sometimes the pessimistic view is the sad truth.

daemonios

I'm sure they listen attentively to the community. Problem is, from my perspective, the sound of money being thrown at the clown store drowns out legitimate player complaints.

Tl;dr: as long as people are paying, ZOS only hear they're doing something right.

5cript

By now I think the balance team does.
At least they take inspiration from the community.
I have seen a lot of changes made actually eerily resemble youtube video content and streamer complains.

Other than that... I dont know. I think a lot of things are "I saw that complaint, but I cannot/dont_want_to act on it."

xaraan

This poll is horrible, but to answer the OP seriously: yes, they do. Often begrudgingly they will agree with something, sometimes happily, especially if it feeds into what they wanted the results of a test to be. Sometimes they choose to ignore feedback despite common sense, etc. In other words their actions on that feedback vary greatly, but they definitely seem to be "listening".

And I will say, from the get-go, they are more concerned with the politeness of the feedback than they are with the quality. If you tell them rudely how precisely something is wrong, they will often ignore it. This is understandable at a direct level: for example, the person you are arguing with gets defensive and nobody listens, this is what managers and the like are for, but the "managers" here are often acting the same way instead of diffusing and listening. This is probably why they are working in a tech type field and not more direct customer relations jobs, I don't blame them. This doesn't mean taking some of those lessons and applying them to this line of work could not be beneficial. If you came to me with a product you bought from my company and told me it was broken, It wouldn't be crazy if after five years of me telling you "we are working on it" your feedback is angry and frustrated.

And I have to say, as someone that is harsh and abrasiveness, and was told my feedback would be more welcomed if it was better stated, this isn't just a theory. Don't get me wrong, I don't fault them for wanting a customer (if they view us as such) to be calm, it helps for a variety of reasons. But if you are wrong, you are wrong no matter how rudely or politely you are told. Though it does give a certain satisfaction watching them implement changes to fix everything you 'rudely' complained out over the next couple years of the game. Or watching their version of a fix fail repeatedly b/c they didn't want to use the ideas stated that could have solved the issue. But neither their desire to ignore rude feedback, nor a players satisfaction of watching them fail b/c of it helps the game in the long run.

But on the base level, the idea that calm constructive feedback is better listened to is mostly true. There are points where a company will jerk customers around or drag things out or blow things off if they see people 'putting up with it', but up to that point, if your feedback is constructive and polite it will be better heard. So if you are one of those people that can calmly deal with frustration to build great feedback (for example: thank you code), then I hope you continue to use your gifts to help the game while those of us not blessed with that ability try as we might to stifle our rage (and sometimes fail).

Rake

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

no

ArcVelarian

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

They almost never listen to the Community feedback when it comes to Balance changes and Class Ability changes.

Dojohoda

A little bit of yes and a little bit of no.
And a lot of they have their own ideas.

Destai

ESO VR!!1!1!1!

The poll could be worded much better.

I think they listen to feedback on the general game experience. They've changed things like wayshrines and skills based on feedback. I'd even say the Antiquities system was implemented to satiate people looking for a non-combat system in the game and build upon the housing system.

They definitely listen to the crown store feedback and keep launching increasingly expensive features there. It's a shame that so little is earnable in games, like mounts. I don't think any amount of polls would change their minds on that strategy.

I also don't feel like they reliably listen to our feedback on community management and moderation. We'll see spikes of improved community engagement, but it's never as warm as you'd see in other games like Guild Wars 2. The latter has noticeably gotten more aggressive.

RefLiberty

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

If they do, they would do something already with Sorc pets.
No one is asking to rewrite the whole class concept but graphical update is needed asap and flapper needs to go
We cry and whine all the time but it is completely ignored.
No combat changes, no class changes, just the graphical update and.replacing annoying flapper.

Davor

I think the really last time Zenimax listened to the community was before One Tamriel. When people didn't buy into their subscription service, they changed ESO from pay to play, to buy to play.

Only time they listened. Or it seems like it.

Destai

ESO VR!!1!1!1!

xaraan wrote: »

This poll is horrible, but to answer the OP seriously: yes, they do. Often begrudgingly they will agree with something, sometimes happily, especially if it feeds into what they wanted the results of a test to be. Sometimes they choose to ignore feedback despite common sense, etc. In other words their actions on that feedback vary greatly, but they definitely seem to be "listening".

And I will say, from the get-go, they are more concerned with the politeness of the feedback than they are with the quality. If you tell them rudely how precisely something is wrong, they will often ignore it. This is understandable at a direct level: for example, the person you are arguing with gets defensive and nobody listens, this is what managers and the like are for, but the "managers" here are often acting the same way instead of diffusing and listening. This is probably why they are working in a tech type field and not more direct customer relations jobs, I don't blame them. This doesn't mean taking some of those lessons and applying them to this line of work could not be beneficial. If you came to me with a product you bought from my company and told me it was broken, It wouldn't be crazy if after five years of me telling you "we are working on it" your feedback is angry and frustrated.

And I have to say, as someone that is harsh and abrasiveness, and was told my feedback would be more welcomed if it was better stated, this isn't just a theory. Don't get me wrong, I don't fault them for wanting a customer (if they view us as such) to be calm, it helps for a variety of reasons. But if you are wrong, you are wrong no matter how rudely or politely you are told. Though it does give a certain satisfaction watching them implement changes to fix everything you 'rudely' complained out over the next couple years of the game. Or watching their version of a fix fail repeatedly b/c they didn't want to use the ideas stated that could have solved the issue. But neither their desire to ignore rude feedback, nor a players satisfaction of watching them fail b/c of it helps the game in the long run.

But on the base level, the idea that calm constructive feedback is better listened to is mostly true. There are points where a company will jerk customers around or drag things out or blow things off if they see people 'putting up with it', but up to that point, if your feedback is constructive and polite it will be better heard. So if you are one of those people that can calmly deal with frustration to build great feedback (for example: thank you code), then I hope you continue to use your gifts to help the game while those of us not blessed with that ability try as we might to stifle our rage (and sometimes fail).

IMO, they need to be less concerned with the politeness of the feedback. It's counterproductive at this point. They need to see that their ways of working are not working for their consumers, along with the technical issues. They really need to quit hiding behind the whole "oh no you're bashing us, [snip]" that they're so wont to do. And how many times have they come out and said, "we could have been better" in some way? How many threads did it take to get some acknowledgement on the performance issues? It's inexcusable.

Their community management is much of a product as is their software. While I'm not condoning people being rude, seeing someone use a product and get mad is really eye-opening as a developer. There's a lot of truth in that raw feedback. Not everyone's equipped to detail their thoughts out like that, but their feelings as a customer are no less valid. This is why talented change management is so important. They need to listen to the rude feedback and reflect on why it keeps happening rather than tucking it under the rug. It's not like we don't see them tucking it under the rug either.

That being said, I think Zenimax does listen to our feedback on many things. It's a juggling act, because not all feedback can be implemented for myriad reasons. I love this game and it's gotten better in most regards over the years. Some changes took a little too long, the monetization has been given too much of priority at times, but overall it's my home game and I want the best for it.

Wilddog73

ESO VR!!1!1!1!

Destai wrote: »

xaraan wrote: »

This poll is horrible, but to answer the OP seriously: yes, they do. Often begrudgingly they will agree with something, sometimes happily, especially if it feeds into what they wanted the results of a test to be. Sometimes they choose to ignore feedback despite common sense, etc. In other words their actions on that feedback vary greatly, but they definitely seem to be "listening".

And I will say, from the get-go, they are more concerned with the politeness of the feedback than they are with the quality. If you tell them rudely how precisely something is wrong, they will often ignore it. This is understandable at a direct level: for example, the person you are arguing with gets defensive and nobody listens, this is what managers and the like are for, but the "managers" here are often acting the same way instead of diffusing and listening. This is probably why they are working in a tech type field and not more direct customer relations jobs, I don't blame them. This doesn't mean taking some of those lessons and applying them to this line of work could not be beneficial. If you came to me with a product you bought from my company and told me it was broken, It wouldn't be crazy if after five years of me telling you "we are working on it" your feedback is angry and frustrated.

And I have to say, as someone that is harsh and abrasiveness, and was told my feedback would be more welcomed if it was better stated, this isn't just a theory. Don't get me wrong, I don't fault them for wanting a customer (if they view us as such) to be calm, it helps for a variety of reasons. But if you are wrong, you are wrong no matter how rudely or politely you are told. Though it does give a certain satisfaction watching them implement changes to fix everything you 'rudely' complained out over the next couple years of the game. Or watching their version of a fix fail repeatedly b/c they didn't want to use the ideas stated that could have solved the issue. But neither their desire to ignore rude feedback, nor a players satisfaction of watching them fail b/c of it helps the game in the long run.

But on the base level, the idea that calm constructive feedback is better listened to is mostly true. There are points where a company will jerk customers around or drag things out or blow things off if they see people 'putting up with it', but up to that point, if your feedback is constructive and polite it will be better heard. So if you are one of those people that can calmly deal with frustration to build great feedback (for example: thank you code), then I hope you continue to use your gifts to help the game while those of us not blessed with that ability try as we might to stifle our rage (and sometimes fail).

IMO, they need to be less concerned with the politeness of the feedback. It's counterproductive at this point. They need to see that their ways of working are not working for their consumers, along with the technical issues. They really need to quit hiding behind the whole "oh no you're bashing us, [snip]" that they're so wont to do. And how many times have they come out and said, "we could have been better" in some way? How many threads did it take to get some acknowledgement on the performance issues? It's inexcusable.

Their community management is much of a product as is their software. While I'm not condoning people being rude, seeing someone use a product and get mad is really eye-opening as a developer. There's a lot of truth in that raw feedback. Not everyone's equipped to detail their thoughts out like that, but their feelings as a customer are no less valid. This is why talented change management is so important. They need to listen to the rude feedback and reflect on why it keeps happening rather than tucking it under the rug. It's not like we don't see them tucking it under the rug either.

That being said, I think Zenimax does listen to our feedback on many things. It's a juggling act, because not all feedback can be implemented for myriad reasons. I love this game and it's gotten better in most regards over the years. Some changes took a little too long, the monetization has been given too much of priority at times, but overall it's my home game and I want the best for it.

Beautiful response.

CasgarTheSomnolent

Define "the community." You can't. The only one that has the data to define the entire ESO community across all platforms and regions...is ZOS. The posters on this forum comprise a fraction of one percent of the total ESO community.

Believe it or not, ZOS is not some sort of godlike entity with unlimited time, people, money, and resistance to mistakes. It's a game development company making an incredibly complicated product with finite resources just like everyone and everything that does anything in the world. Suggestions, fixes, requests, and everything that seems entirely logical to people on the outside looking in may not look the same from the inside looking out. That's business. That's life.

Nobody speaks for "the community." There ARE people that can present an opinion on a subsample of the community. If Fengrush put up a poll asking for thoughts on something related to PvP, he could probably get 10,000 respondents easily. That would be a sizable number of people that might make ZOS pay closer attention to that particular issue than others. But it would still be a simplification of the opinions of just the fraction of people who follow Fengrush, saw the poll, and voted in it. And it would still be up to ZOS to determine how that info fits into their own internal plans none of us know anything about even if they found it fully credible and logical. And that's about the best case scenario for getting a large amount of data sourced directly from "the community."

Establish your opinion as your own and only that. That applies to anyone that thinks they speak for "the community." And if you do think or know that your opinion lines up with a large group of people--maybe you even "represent" them--PROVE IT. Or just state your opinion and make a good case why it should be listened to. Perhaps you'll pique the interest of someone from ZOS into looking into it further using their own abilities if you make a good case. But even if you do make a good case, you still can't expect that everything will go the way you want because you did. There's more "at play" here.

Elsonso

Destai wrote: »

IMO, they need to be less concerned with the politeness of the feedback. It's counterproductive at this point. They need to see that their ways of working are not working for their consumers, along with the technical issues. They really need to quit hiding behind the whole "oh no you're bashing us, [snip]" that they're so wont to do. And how many times have they come out and said, "we could have been better" in some way? How many threads did it take to get some acknowledgement on the performance issues? It's inexcusable.

Nah. I disagree on select points. In terms of performance, ZOS has laid out a plan and they are following it. The update they just put out is the most detailed single update since they started this project. It seems to be working, although they have missed a couple of deadlines, and had a couple of setbacks. They are obviously fixing forward, and are still following that plan. I have seen progress at multiple points along the path already. I am seeing additional performance improvements on PTS, and I've only been on PTS for a couple of hours.

Could ZOS go faster? Definitely. Will they go faster? Probably not.

(Edit: On customer service, I could say what I really think, but ZOS would just delete it for "bashing".)

Kiralyn2000

Wilddog73 wrote: »

Honestly, I wasn't expecting the "No" option to lead the way at all, but there's clearly some discontent.

Again, this is a game forum. Pretty much every one I've ever been on has been at least 50% "discontent". Especially the ones for online/continuous-development games.

Destai

ESO VR!!1!1!1!

Elsonso wrote: »

Destai wrote: »

IMO, they need to be less concerned with the politeness of the feedback. It's counterproductive at this point. They need to see that their ways of working are not working for their consumers, along with the technical issues. They really need to quit hiding behind the whole "oh no you're bashing us, [snip]" that they're so wont to do. And how many times have they come out and said, "we could have been better" in some way? How many threads did it take to get some acknowledgement on the performance issues? It's inexcusable.

Nah. I disagree on select points. In terms of performance, ZOS has laid out a plan and they are following it. The update they just put out is the most detailed single update since they started this project. It seems to be working, although they have missed a couple of deadlines, and had a couple of setbacks. They are obviously fixing forward, and are still following that plan. I have seen progress at multiple points along the path already. I am seeing additional performance improvements on PTS, and I've only been on PTS for a couple of hours.

Could ZOS go faster? Definitely. Will they go faster? Probably not.

(Edit: On customer service, I could say what I really think, but ZOS would just delete it for "bashing".)

I don't expect them to be blindingly fast on these deep performance issue. I'd rather them take it slow and deliberate. I try to give them the benefit of the doubt. There was an impressions months ago that they had no inkling what was causing the performance issues in Q1. It's all in how things are communicated. That plan came after this, by the way:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/6831414#Comment_6831414

It shouldn't get to that level.

TineaCruris

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

Elsonso wrote: »

Destai wrote: »

IMO, they need to be less concerned with the politeness of the feedback. It's counterproductive at this point. They need to see that their ways of working are not working for their consumers, along with the technical issues. They really need to quit hiding behind the whole "oh no you're bashing us, [snip]" that they're so wont to do. And how many times have they come out and said, "we could have been better" in some way? How many threads did it take to get some acknowledgement on the performance issues? It's inexcusable.

Nah. I disagree on select points. In terms of performance, ZOS has laid out a plan and they are following it. The update they just put out is the most detailed single update since they started this project. It seems to be working, although they have missed a couple of deadlines, and had a couple of setbacks. They are obviously fixing forward, and are still following that plan. I have seen progress at multiple points along the path already. I am seeing additional performance improvements on PTS, and I've only been on PTS for a couple of hours.

Could ZOS go faster? Definitely. Will they go faster? Probably not.

(Edit: On customer service, I could say what I really think, but ZOS would just delete it for "bashing".)

ZOS just downgraded the performance at the end of the MYM event, after fixing most of the performance issues just for the duration of the event. ZOS could have most of the performance issues fixed right now. They are CHOOSING not to make the investment necessary to make it happen. Again, they just fixed most of the performance issues for the MYM event, then downgraded us back to trash can performance as soon as the event was over. The poor performance we get is a CHOICE ZOS makes and forces us to live with.

I'm not saying they aren't trying to make things work better within the constraints the accounting department has set. I'm saying the accounting department is forcing the devs into an impossible situation by not providing them the resources they need that allows their software run as advertised.

Elsonso

Destai wrote: »

I don't expect them to be blindingly fast on these deep performance issue. I'd rather them take it slow and deliberate. I try to give them the benefit of the doubt. There was an impressions months ago that they had no inkling what was causing the performance issues in Q1. It's all in how things are communicated. That plan came after this, by the way:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/6831414#Comment_6831414

It shouldn't get to that level.

Sometimes things break and it takes time to identify and fix them. That is definitely the case with the input lag that was introduced in Harrowstorm, and that has seen improvement, but not fixed yet.

The performance story here is very long, though, so it is not really accurate to say "that plan came after this", since it did not. I don't think the plan has changed much over the last couple of years, other than ZOS adds to it as they go. What has changed is the level of information that they are giving us. This is the.. third(?)... improvement to that by my count. I am liking the new level of detail. Not sure about the frequency of updates.

One thing I have noticed in here is that some people tend to discount what ZOS says. On occasion, people have simply accused them of lying about it. My observation is that some specific performance problem is not fixed, and there are people really don't care about the ones that ZOS did fix, so the picture that is painted is that ZOS did not fix anything. I am not that invested in a specific fix, so I do appreciate all the progress that ZOS has made over the last couple of years with performance. I don't like the stumbles, but the forward progress has been nice.

Destai

ESO VR!!1!1!1!

Elsonso wrote: »

Destai wrote: »

I don't expect them to be blindingly fast on these deep performance issue. I'd rather them take it slow and deliberate. I try to give them the benefit of the doubt. There was an impressions months ago that they had no inkling what was causing the performance issues in Q1. It's all in how things are communicated. That plan came after this, by the way:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/6831414#Comment_6831414

It shouldn't get to that level.

Sometimes things break and it takes time to identify and fix them. That is definitely the case with the input lag that was introduced in Harrowstorm, and that has seen improvement, but not fixed yet.

The performance story here is very long, though, so it is not really accurate to say "that plan came after this", since it did not. I don't think the plan has changed much over the last couple of years, other than ZOS adds to it as they go. What has changed is the level of information that they are giving us. This is the.. third(?)... improvement to that by my count. I am liking the new level of detail. Not sure about the frequency of updates.

One thing I have noticed in here is that some people tend to discount what ZOS says. On occasion, people have simply accused them of lying about it. My observation is that some specific performance problem is not fixed, and there are people really don't care about the ones that ZOS did fix, so the picture that is painted is that ZOS did not fix anything. I am not that invested in a specific fix, so I do appreciate all the progress that ZOS has made over the last couple of years with performance. I don't like the stumbles, but the forward progress has been nice.

I appreciate the progress too. And I trust their technical explanations - when given. Sure you get your toxic folks who think ZOS can never do right, but I don't think that. I am very happy and continually impressed by the improved communication since then. I just hope it's sustained.

jircris11

Wilddog73 wrote: »

Holy one sided poll. Good job.

TineaCruris

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

Elsonso wrote: »

Destai wrote: »

I don't expect them to be blindingly fast on these deep performance issue. I'd rather them take it slow and deliberate. I try to give them the benefit of the doubt. There was an impressions months ago that they had no inkling what was causing the performance issues in Q1. It's all in how things are communicated. That plan came after this, by the way:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/6831414#Comment_6831414

It shouldn't get to that level.

Sometimes things break and it takes time to identify and fix them. That is definitely the case with the input lag that was introduced in Harrowstorm, and that has seen improvement, but not fixed yet.

The performance story here is very long, though, so it is not really accurate to say "that plan came after this", since it did not. I don't think the plan has changed much over the last couple of years, other than ZOS adds to it as they go. What has changed is the level of information that they are giving us. This is the.. third(?)... improvement to that by my count. I am liking the new level of detail. Not sure about the frequency of updates.

One thing I have noticed in here is that some people tend to discount what ZOS says. On occasion, people have simply accused them of lying about it. My observation is that some specific performance problem is not fixed, and there are people really don't care about the ones that ZOS did fix, so the picture that is painted is that ZOS did not fix anything. I am not that invested in a specific fix, so I do appreciate all the progress that ZOS has made over the last couple of years with performance. I don't like the stumbles, but the forward progress has been nice.

The trend over the last couple years is for things to get progressively worse. In terms of performance, the one and only bright spot in over a year was the MYM event. Performance is at a near all time low right now. It's been worse only when we can't log in or we get disconnected every 15 minutes or so.

xaraan

Destai wrote: »

xaraan wrote: »

This poll is horrible, but to answer the OP seriously: yes, they do. Often begrudgingly they will agree with something, sometimes happily, especially if it feeds into what they wanted the results of a test to be. Sometimes they choose to ignore feedback despite common sense, etc. In other words their actions on that feedback vary greatly, but they definitely seem to be "listening".

And I will say, from the get-go, they are more concerned with the politeness of the feedback than they are with the quality. If you tell them rudely how precisely something is wrong, they will often ignore it. This is understandable at a direct level: for example, the person you are arguing with gets defensive and nobody listens, this is what managers and the like are for, but the "managers" here are often acting the same way instead of diffusing and listening. This is probably why they are working in a tech type field and not more direct customer relations jobs, I don't blame them. This doesn't mean taking some of those lessons and applying them to this line of work could not be beneficial. If you came to me with a product you bought from my company and told me it was broken, It wouldn't be crazy if after five years of me telling you "we are working on it" your feedback is angry and frustrated.

And I have to say, as someone that is harsh and abrasiveness, and was told my feedback would be more welcomed if it was better stated, this isn't just a theory. Don't get me wrong, I don't fault them for wanting a customer (if they view us as such) to be calm, it helps for a variety of reasons. But if you are wrong, you are wrong no matter how rudely or politely you are told. Though it does give a certain satisfaction watching them implement changes to fix everything you 'rudely' complained out over the next couple years of the game. Or watching their version of a fix fail repeatedly b/c they didn't want to use the ideas stated that could have solved the issue. But neither their desire to ignore rude feedback, nor a players satisfaction of watching them fail b/c of it helps the game in the long run.

But on the base level, the idea that calm constructive feedback is better listened to is mostly true. There are points where a company will jerk customers around or drag things out or blow things off if they see people 'putting up with it', but up to that point, if your feedback is constructive and polite it will be better heard. So if you are one of those people that can calmly deal with frustration to build great feedback (for example: thank you code), then I hope you continue to use your gifts to help the game while those of us not blessed with that ability try as we might to stifle our rage (and sometimes fail).

IMO, they need to be less concerned with the politeness of the feedback. It's counterproductive at this point. They need to see that their ways of working are not working for their consumers, along with the technical issues. They really need to quit hiding behind the whole "oh no you're bashing us, [snip]" that they're so wont to do. And how many times have they come out and said, "we could have been better" in some way? How many threads did it take to get some acknowledgement on the performance issues? It's inexcusable.

Their community management is much of a product as is their software. While I'm not condoning people being rude, seeing someone use a product and get mad is really eye-opening as a developer. There's a lot of truth in that raw feedback. Not everyone's equipped to detail their thoughts out like that, but their feelings as a customer are no less valid. This is why talented change management is so important. They need to listen to the rude feedback and reflect on why it keeps happening rather than tucking it under the rug. It's not like we don't see them tucking it under the rug either.

That being said, I think Zenimax does listen to our feedback on many things. It's a juggling act, because not all feedback can be implemented for myriad reasons. I love this game and it's gotten better in most regards over the years. Some changes took a little too long, the monetization has been given too much of priority at times, but overall it's my home game and I want the best for it.

If you think I was agreeing with their concern, then I did a poor job of explaining myself.

I do think that the folks that are constructive and polite are well heard and helpful for us, but I do think the feedback is more important than how nicely it is told to them. Trust me, I've had long discussions with some of them about how they should care more about fixing the game than controlling how feedback is given. And at this point, they do not.

They care more about the marketing side, controlling message, and various petty issues over actually improving the game. Otherwise things would be very different with the game. I'm sure to MMO history ESO will hold a decent spot because it was popular enough and sold well enough, but to anyone that actually knows, it will be the game that always came up short of what it could have been because of how it was run.

eKsDee

Never. Whenever I see this "game", my eyes sink into their sockets and I ironically find myself relating to the soulless husk of my character. Zenimax is dead inside and so is my hope for this game.

Closest option to my own opinion.

Zenimax listens to feedback that either already aligns with their intent, or is backed by a mountain load of salt and screeching all over the forums and in-game. Very rarely do they listen to well presented feedback that doesn't align with their intent, outside of a few cases.

I'm not talking about the biased "make my class better!!!!1!" feedback, but genuinely good, unbiased feedback with a thorough explanation behind it. We saw it with cast times on ults, we saw it with the move speed nerf, we saw it with the various sustain nerfs, and we absolutely see it with *** changes to different classes, weapons, skill lines and sets.

Sure, there is an (un)healthy dose of screeching that came with all of these, but there were also genuinely good, unbiased feedback threads that came with them, that got completely ignored, and still are ignored to this day. Zenimax still struggles to not prove this thread right every patch, even 2 years on from its creation.

If the feedback aligns with their intent, making their job at fulfilling said feedback easier without having to budge on what they were going to do anyways, they'll take it to heart. If the feedback is delivered through a million megaphones aimed squarely at Zenimax HQ, a la the Bart Simpson method, they'll reluctantly listen just to shut us up. But if it's any sort of genuine feedback, it really seems as if an intern picks it up and dumps it right into the trash, before a higher up even takes a peek at it.

Elsonso

TineaCruris wrote: »

The trend over the last couple years is for things to get progressively worse. In terms of performance, the one and only bright spot in over a year was the MYM event. Performance is at a near all time low right now. It's been worse only when we can't log in or we get disconnected every 15 minutes or so.

To me, it seems to depend on what you do in the game, what your perception is of what is happening, and your tolerance for things that are out of spec.

I stay out of Cyrodiil. That right there seems to be a massive performance boost and an overall perception upgrade. From what I have seen of PVE solo, small group, and a limited number of trials, performance is not nearly as bad as described for Cyrodiil.

I have seen improvement since the disaster that was Harrowstorm. While I do still see skill desync/latency issues, they certainly seem much less frequent than back in early Spring. Right now, I can definitely say that desync problems have been a lot worse for me than they are now.

EDIT: This has gotten a little off track, but the reason I am talking about performance in a "does ZOS listen" thread is that they have been working on performance for years, and for years people have been telling them to talk to us more, and they have incrementally done that. Hopefully, this new quarterly update, which has the details that I want to see, but I am not yet sold on the frequency, is an example of ZOS listening and responding to what we are saying.

I don't know what ZOS is doing in Cyrodiil. ZOS has been fiddling with performance in Cyrodiil for at least 5 years, now. Quite frankly, after all this time, they should know precisely what it takes to fix Cyrodiil and should be either fixing that, or coming up with ways to make it look fixed. MYM is a perfect example of the latter, so I don't know what they are doing. I don't subscribe to the "accountant puppeteer" scenario because it does not fit well with available information. I think it is something far more stupid than that. ZOS needs to practice some of that communications stuff and talk to us.

But, then again, this is the same company that is responsible for ZOS Customer Support, and that certainly adds weight to any tight purse accountant theories.